• • •
Bankers and businessmen, as the whole world could have predicted, were, without exception, condemned. Go directly to hell, the Divine Judge would roar upon being confronted by one of them; do not pass Go, do not collect $200. The egalitarians were also sent to hell, of course, but they were allowed to collect the money. Sometimes, even the Divine Mind is scrutable…
“West Condon Chronicle.”
“Mr. Miller, please.”
“Whom shall I say—?”
“It’s the Black Hand again.”
“Oh. Well, madame, Mr. Miller cannot talk to you. He is a very busy man, and he doesn’t have time for your sort.”
“Don’t I know it.”
“(Who’s that, Annie?) (Oh, it’s just that crazy lady who keeps calling up saying she’s the Black Hand. I already told her to—) (That’s all right, Annie. I’ll take it.) Hello, Black Hand.” Scratch. Drag. “(Annie, get off the phone!)” Click. “Say, I always knew you were hilarious, Happy, but I didn’t realize you were such a goddamn genius. If you don’t mind, I think I’m going to run your Judgments in our Good Friday issue.”
“I’m not looking for fame, Mr. Editor, I’m looking for the payoff.”
“And the poor unendowed ladies! You are indeed pitiless!”
“Just cleaning out the competition. Is Annie a cute girl?”
“Oh yeah, very. Certainly not hellbound by your rules.”
“Oh?” She’s not quite sure how she’s supposed to take that. Calls for a visit. “You already owe me a fortune in postage, you black heel.”
His laughter. “You’re right. Listen, I promise, I’ll at least stop out to see you a minute, if not today, tomorrow at the latest.”
A pause. She ought to forget it, not mention it, but she says, “Say, Tiger, is it true about all those wild orgies you’re having over there with those Christians?”
He laughs. “Sure, it’s great! Just me and Johnny Bruno and an ecstatic houseful of naked old widows!”
“I heard some of those widows weren’t so old.”
“What do you mean?”
What is it makes her open her big mouth? She hesitates, then says, “Oh, a guy called. Said he was a friend and told me things he thought I’d like to know. About Mrs. Cravens, for example.”
“Oh yeah? Sounds like some friend. Listen, Happy, that’s a lot of crap, there’s nothing there. I don’t know why anybody’s so goddamn adolescent as to—”
“He said he thought I might be able to persuade you to get out of that group and away from that woman, be better for me, for you, and everybody else. He said.”
“Well, he’s got it all wrong, whoever the hell he is. Besides, that woman’s got the melancholiest bottom I ever saw.”
“You’ve had a good look?”
“Sure. At all the orgies.”
Womwom pours orange juice, boils eggs, makes toast. Elan, gazing out on the rain, eats distractedly. “Wylie,” she says, looking up at him, her pupils shrunk to pinpricks by the long look at too much light, “do you remember how, after the powers of darkness had chased us from Carlyle, we could not remember who the fourth man was?”
“Yes.”
“Do you recall what he looked like?”
Womwom munches toast meditatively. “Not very well.”
“He was dark, Wylie, and rather tall. I remember how his glittering eyes frightened me so.”
“Yes, perhaps that’s so.” He doesn’t remember.
“Wylie … I think I know now who he was!”
It is Friday, the day for fish. It is March, the month of the fish. The destruction of the world by water, the dissolving of prevalent structures, the liberation from things merely seen or touched. The fish. The unconscious. The cyclic renovation. Fertility of the spirit. “Come ye after me, and I will make you fishers of men.” Mana’s closed and perfect circle, a gift from her childhood, assumes a new dimension, a new beauty. Elan’s primordial energy now whirls upon it through measurable phases. The soul is spun upon it, falling now into matter, climbing now toward its source, wriggling through the twelfth moment toward its rebirth. Unity fragments into multiplicity upon it, multiplicity reassembles itself to unity. All is in it, on it, leaping, turning, cavorting, promenading, falling, climbing … swimming. The fish. She consumes it. Defeat? Reclusion? Negation? No! Mana awaits with excitement and with certainty her turn on the wheel, her inexorable rebirth! Outside, it rains. Dissolves.
Rain. The banker stares out on it from his office window on the second floor. It reflects his own depression. He remembers how, after the war, there was so much hope here, so much promise. And now it’s all going sour. “You’re not in the nineteenth century, son,” his Dad told him, dying. “Get your money out of here. Coal’s on the way out.” But he couldn’t. It was home. Not that he’s in any real financial trouble, he’s hedged properly on all bets. But that’s not the point. This is his home and his home is sick. He believes it is really a matter of spirit. Ted Cavanaugh has faith in the spirit, or, as he puts it, in will. A community of men of good wilclass="underline" his ideal.
So, he has been looking for something to stimulate the community spirit again. Something they could all believe in, rich and poor, miners and merchants, Italians and gentiles. Working together, they can make West Condon as great as any town in the United States, he’s convinced of that, highblown as it may sound. But something has to provide the spark, something has to unite them. This little cult at the miner Bruno’s house occurred to him as an idea, but it seemed too negative. Tried to work up a Special Commission on Industrial Planning. Not much interest. Searched for new industry. So far, nothing: bad labor history. He tried at least to keep the mine open. He offered money. He couldn’t offer enough. It’s not official, but he knows they will close it. And so, he is back at the cult. It has given him an idea. A committee. Communal exercising of a little common sense. Start with it as a specific problem, get the town enthused, as many people into the thing as possible, then subtly convert it into something positive, a kind of all-community WPA and sales team, so to speak.
But, on principle, he just can’t fight anybody else’s religion, no matter how absurd it is. They had to do something first, hopefully something offensive. And now, what do you know, that old Wobbly agitator Red Baxter has done it for them. For him. Created that old vacuum, the filling of which is every American’s first nature: the need for a third force.
He picks up his phone, dials. The checkerboard on his pad is now, virtually, one huge black square, though, within the blackness, a pattern is still discernible. “Hello, Maury? Maury, this is Ted calling. I’m getting in touch with several of the fellows, ones I can count on. I’ve just been thinking, Maury …”
So, unobtrusively, the point of no return is passed. No one has expressed it, yet everyone knows it. Nor can any really doubt that this knowledge is now general, distorted in places perhaps, but widespread. Rahim — barrister, adviser, procurator, scrivener, sacramentalist, mathematician, and historian — is the last to concede it. He continues to press for secrecy, but observes that it is futile. On the streets of West Condon, he is avoided. Ugly phonecalls are received. Letters. Well, good riddance to the fools! Soon enough, it will be his turn to laugh! Hah!
He shuns the common meeting places, spends less time at his office, takes no new cases. He catches up on his filing, ridiculous task, of course, yet an old habit here impels him. His cats still give him solace, but more and more he is passing his days with Elan or at the Bruno house. He is quick to perceive the weaknesses of the others, of course, but the very lack which he fills — almost, one could say, with mathematical exactitude — is, as it were, the final proof of the veracity of his calculations. Thirty days.